The screen is 5.01". Is that diagonal, one side of a rectangle (looks like) or square?
I, for one, have come to loathe the fact that we still market screens by this rather misleading metric. (i.e. diagonal length) I know the pythagorean theorem, but that does not help me if I only know the hypotenuse. Considering that the plethora of new television are now rectangular to resolve the new aspect ratio to accommodate film and fancy TV shows, only knowing the hypotenuse really tells me squat about relative size. I suppose I could figure out the sides using calculus and a ratio of 16:9, but really...

Besides my rant about unsavory marketing, I think that news of this new screen is astounding! For me, the higher refresh rate is encouraging; I have seen the Reader refresh, and it's too jarring at the moment. I'm on the fence about overall price of the Reader (including content), but this seems like it brings the experience that much closer to simply turning a page.

Cannot wait to hear who will be implementing this screen in their product.

I've always been rather annoyed by the diagonal measurement of screens too.

We have a 26" TV (that I've had for 10 years), and I was trying to decide how big an HD screen I'd need to get the same height (I like the size it is, okay? ). That ought to be a pretty straightforward business, but I too had to trot out the pythagorean theorem, and the ratios, and still ended up taking a tape measure to the store before I'd believe my results (~40" if anyone wants to know). And the annoying thing is that I just wanted to know what size screen I should be watching the prices on, as I don't plan to replace my perfectly good TV until I have to.

I guess they came up with the diagonal measurement because it gives them a single number to put in the advertisements rather than two. And I s'pose I've gotten mostly used to it, as long as they don't go changing the stinkin' ratios, anyway.

To make matters worse, a CRT is measured to the corner of the surrounding bevel but LCDs are measured to the corner of the actual display seen, making a LCD of the same size have a larger actual display area than an LCD. Not sure about E-ink or Plasma Screen displays but they are probably more like the LCD measurement.

Don't forget to take into account the format of the screen also. 4:3? 16:9? 16:10? 15:9?

All use diagonal but depending on the ratio it can drastically change how things look on screen. The wider the screen the larger the diagonal gets without changing the height (or even shrinking it if you get the same diagonal size but with a wider screen).

I must have basic algebra problems: I could not create a sufficient formula for 'b' expressed as a function of 'a.' Suppose that I am quite rusty.

@ Natch: I share your pain. I have a 32" CRT, and when I move next year, I do not wish it to move with me.
I went online to see what size I should get. Found some reviews of 32" LCD's, and they are considered "smaller" televisions in the world of flat panel! My 32" CRT is quite large to me, so I'm thinking that a 40" LCD will be all the bump that I need.

You'll need to hold it 12" or less from your face to see all the detail depending on the quality of your eye sight. That's pretty good, or pretty bad depending on whether you use bifocals.

NatCh,

When you replace your big vacuum tube, you're going to have to do some more advanced trig. Measure from the front of the tube to the backrest of your favorite chair. Measure the height of your tube's viewing area and divide that in half. Draw a right triangle on a sheet of paper with one vertex a lot narrower than the other. Label the short side with the tely's measurement and the long side with your chair's distance. Divide short by long and use a calculator to calculate the arc tangent, tan [-1], or tan inv. That's the magic angle to make sure the new flat panel looks the same size as the old tube. Write it down in the narrow corner. Figure out how much closer to the wall you can put the new tely and run the calculations backwards to get the new tely's new height (of the viewing area).

Two things that often disappoint people because they didn't know to consider them are image size when watching NTSC, PAL and SD formats and, pushing that new tely up against the wall to reclaim some of the old tube's space; thus making it look smaller.

When you replace your big vacuum tube, you're going to have to do some more advanced trig. Measure from the front of the tube to the backrest of your favorite chair. Measure the height of your tube's viewing area and divide that in half. Draw a right triangle on a sheet of paper with one vertex a lot narrower than the other. Label the short side with the tely's measurement and the long side with your chair's distance. Divide short by long and use a calculator to calculate the arc tangent, tan [-1], or tan inv. That's the magic angle to make sure the new flat panel looks the same size as the old tube. Write it down in the narrow corner. Figure out how much closer to the wall you can put the new tely and run the calculations backwards to get the new tely's new height (of the viewing area).

Or ... I could buy one with the same vertical measurement, and move my chair a bit closer.

This LCD screen is not that good because of much worse reflectance ratio (meaning darker white).
Slightly better contrast ratio is what they advertise, but
even extremely dark black would still be difficult to read if white is not white enough.